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Duke basketball bracketology: Blue Devils will be tested early in NCAA Tournament

dani mohr, the fayetteville observer
·2 min read
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The Duke Blue Devils will immediately be tested during the NCAA Tournament.

Duke defeated Louisville to extend a three-game win streak for the Blue Devils. Duke has a NET ranking at 29 with a 3-6 record in Quadrant 1 and 4-2 in Quadrant 2.

With three games remaining in the regular season against Virginia Tech, NC State and UNC, the Blue Devils will need to win out to get a higher seed in the March Madness tournament. A win over the Tar Heels would give the Blue Devils another Quadrant 1 win.

Here's what a handful of bracketology projections say about Duke's NCAA Tournament status heading into this week's games:

Joe Lunardi, ESPN.com: 7-seed

Lunardi has the Blue Devils in the Midwest Region as the No. 7 seed matching up with No. 10 Missouri in the first round.

Duke will be tested following a win in the first game with a potential game against No. 2 Texas, followed by potential matchups with either No. 6 Northwestern or No. 3 Marquette.

Jerry Palm, CBSSports.com: 6-seed

Palm's bracketology has the Blue Devils at the No. 6 seed matching up against either West Virginia or Wisconsin.

A win in the first matchup would set up Duke to be tested against No. 3 UConn. If the Blue Devils want to avoid one of the best teams in the country in the second round, it'll need to win a lot over the next three weeks.

USA TODAY: 8-seed

USA TODAY has Duke basketball at the No. 8 seed in the East Region in the Des Moines Regional. It also has Michigan State, Rutgers and Arkansas at the same rank.

If the Blue Devils want to stay in the top 10, taking down their remaining conference opponents is mandatory.

Bracket Matrix: 7-seed

The Bracket Matrix formula considers the preeminent bracketology efforts from across the web and averages them out to create a composite 68-team field.

There's a clear pattern here, Duke will need to win out the last few games of the regular season to do well in the first and second round against a potential top 10 opponent.

This article originally appeared on The Fayetteville Observer: Duke basketball bracketology Blue Devils tested NCAA Tournament